Last year, Gwyneth Paltrow dedicated an issue of GOOP to Chinese New Year and featured a lady called Adele Reising who recommended a “winter bath” consisting of milk and essential oils. Click here for a refresher. When I asked my ma about a milk bath she said it’s a f-cking waste of money. She also says that the smell of those “oils” is how white people try to change the Chinese odour. We have a smell. It comes from the crazy herbs we eat. It takes some getting used to. But it’s a hard sell. Like, you can’t make a ching chong shoppe in Manhattan palatable to rich Westerners if they get turned off by the smell of our culture. Which is why they keep inventing these pretty oils and giving them an oriental flavour.

This year, to celebrate Chinese New Year, GOOP is featuring Hong Kong. It’s the usual list of high end hotels. And for some reason, Gwyneth went to Hong Kong to eat at a restaurant called ZUMA which is an extension of a restaurant by the same name in London…

Is that really how people travel? Because…

If we’re talking food in Hong Kong, it’s a f-cking crime not to hit up a noodle stand by the side of the road. In fact, if I were making recommendations, I’d tell you to do a noodle stand competition. Go to a different one every day you’re there to find the best.

Also, for all her spiritualism, she somehow overlooked the Big Buddha at Lantau Island. And no mention of the night markets either. Or Lan Kwai Fong. Or Victoria Peak which is super romantic if you do it at the right time. Or, or, or, or… so much.

This list she’s come up with, it feels like it’s been recommended by expats. I wonder if, when she was in Hong Kong, Gwyneth actually spoke to a Chinese person who wasn’t hired to wait on her.

Click here for her Hong Kong GOOP.

Oh and please. If she really, really wanted to get down with China and all, she would have taken a photo of herself doing the double Peace sign. It’s the ultimate Asian pose. I don’t know what it is we love so much about cameras and the peace sign, but it’s kinda like our secret handshake. And it goes really well with rabbit ears this year.


Photos from Wenn.com and ChinaFotoPress/Gettyimages.com